Why not medical marijuana in RP?

If there is an evolving policy pattern across US whereby medical marijuana can now be prescribed for use of patients, why not one in RP – free of any serious legal debate?

Can not the government now relax the law against use of marijuana for purely medical purpose?

Clinical researches are about to prove of the medical value of marijuana use on patients with HIV or AIDS, quite apart from the many other chronic illnesses that this “weed” provide relief to.

Fact is, from an ordinary health care point of view, marijuana is known to stop patients from losing weight, for improving their moods, and for altering need for many pain medications. And marijuana is used to treat patients of cancer or glaucoma, not to mention on patients suffering from paralysis.

Anyone advocates against medical marijuana? – this question one may ask. In other words, are we here to configure a new legislative drug policy in so far as marijuana is concerned?

In any hospital, illnesses are as varied as the medical approaches for their treatment. Thus, more patients with varying forms of illnesses can be treated with a seemingly ‘wonder weed’. There are findings as well as ongoing researches pointing to the treatment of neuropathy patients or those suffering from nerve pain by the use of marijuana without the side effects of prescription narcotic pain killers.

Why not marijuana for medicine? Or why shouldn’t it be a medical option, one way or other? Medical surveys available may yet be unsatisfactory with physicians agreeing to use marijuana, were it be allowed, from 32% to 37% of those surveyed.

Can we not sort of do a paradigm shift in thinking more of the positive use of marijuana rather than its seeming negative substance abuse? Or these notes on the subject, if again:

In a sharp policy shift, the Obama administration told federal attorneys not to prosecute patients who use marijuana for medical reasons or dispensaries in states where it has been legalized.

A Justice Department official said the formal guidelines were issued Monday in a policy change reflecting President Barack Obama’s views. The Bush administration had said it could enforce the federal law against marijuana and that it trumped state laws.

The decision was praised by activists in California, the first state to legalize medical marijuana in 1996. But concern remains among some medical and law enforcement authorities about hundreds of clinics thought to be selling pot under the protection of state law and without regard to health.

As a candidate during his presidential bid last year, Obama said he intended to halt raids of medical marijuana facilities operating legally under state laws.

After he took office in January, a Drug Enforcement Administration raid on a medical marijuana dispensary in Lake Tahoe, California, raised questions about whether he would follow that pledge.

A White House spokesman Monday repeated Obama’s view that “federal resources should not be used to circumvent state laws.” And Attorney General Eric Holder said he would follow Obama’s position.

Stephen Gutwillig, California head of the Drug Policy Alliance, called the move a good first step.

“There is a fundamental need of patients to access marijuana as medicine right now,” Gutwillig said. “While it’s great to see the Obama administration radically de-escalate the Bush and Clinton administrations’ war on medical marijuana patients, more needs to be done to protect sick people and their caregivers.”

About a dozen states have followed California in adopting medical marijuana laws.

Is it not time enough to start the ‘grand debate’ on medical marijuana? What do our legislators in Congress say or the occupant in Malacanang?